William White, 20, male, white, was a developmentally disabled resident of the New Haven Regional Center who joined two fellow residents, 15-year-old Sandra Hedler and 23-year-old Donna Schlitter, for an outing to West Rock Park on August 12, 1970. In the wooded park, the trio were ambushed and bludgeoned with a large stone. Hedler and Schlitter were discovered that day behind a ventilator shaft in a park tunnel; White was found alive nearby and taken to St.
Raphael’s Hospital, where he succumbed to his injuries seventeen days later.
Witnesses told investigators they had seen a late-model blue car in the area around the time of the attack. Police canvassed hundreds of similar vehicles and soon focused on a local milkman, Harold W. Meade, whose car matched the descriptions. Meade was arrested on December 11, 1970.
In 1972, Meade pleaded guilty to the West Rock Park killings, acknowledging responsibility for the murders tied to the New Haven Regional Center residents. He received a life sentence. Over time, authorities and reporters linked Meade by suspicion—not formal charges—to other Connecticut killings from 1969, a pattern of bludgeonings that echoed the brutality in West Rock Park. He died in prison in 2007.
